I started blogging ‘professionally’ sometime in 2006. That year — and the couple of years after were of a different era. It truly was a different time: Our Awesome Planet had a day job. Yugatech had little to no access to tech companies. Coy and AJ were still alive and rocking it. How time flies. These were the days before social media. Before Twitter and Facebook. Before ‘Trending’ and #hashtags. Blogging — online publishing in general was a cottage industry and it was a steep hill to surmount.
In light of recent events, I decided to republish a portion of the closing remarks I gave during the 2nd Philippine Blog Awards, with some edits to the flow.
– Begin –
Tonight, I’d like to share three head fakes that I have personally learned from blogging in celebration of our notion of freedoms which this country enjoys to an awesome extent.
The first head fake:
Blogging teaches us to distinguish our temperament from character. There are many metaphysical truths to the human being, and the concept of temperament and character are perhaps the most interesting. Temperament, simply defined, is who we are while character is defined as who we want to become. Temperament is losing it, and flaming others in comments. Character is sincerely apologizing afterwards. In public.
The second head fake: Blogging teaches us to deal. Yes, to deal. Not really to deal with critics. Not really to deal with PR contacts. Not really to deal with making money online; but to deal. This is the art of dealing with everything. If there is one thing I admire with seasoned bloggers, it is their ability to deal with the impediments that come their way. You will agree with me when I say that the local blogosphere is very colorful, as we are involved in real conversations with fellow bloggers, PR contacts and ad agencies, restaurants, government, NGO’s, multinationals — the list goes on. I admire bloggers who have the ability to deal with the politics of human design and more importantly, how they resolve it. That they can survive criticism, the pointing of hands, the flame bait, the mob, and come back to post the next day, with a more firm resolve.
This brings me to my last point, because “dealing with something†is never complete without conviction.
The third and last head fake: Blogging helps us reaffirm our personal convictions. It is with this affirmation that we form insight on our concept of truth.
“But what is truth?â€, asked Pontius Pilate.
What is the truth behind pay-per-post, behind controversies of SEO and the “nofollow†variable, about link-selling or blog advertising, or even attending blog events for loot?
The truth is conviction. If there was a right answer, we wouldn’t be blogging. Rather, what is important is that when we are asked what our personal convictions are about these things, we tell the unbiased truth, and unlike Pilate, we should not wash our hands. As bloggers, we value our convictions and integrity the most.
Character. The Art of Dealing. Conviction. These are three things that sum the totality of my message: It is not about how well we blog – it is about how well we live our life.
The Original Post from 2008: ‘Closing Remarks’ from the 2nd Philippine Blog Awards